A/N: Early Chapter, so throw some more STONES! Do leave a review if you haven't yet.
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[World's Grave]
The silence of the World's Grave was absolute.
Only the dry shuffle of Void's boots against ancient stone echoed through the darkness. But ever so often, a pained and frustrated grunt would reverberate across the ancient halls.
Void cursed as he slapped a the roll of parchment away.
The scroll hit the floor beside him and with a defeated sigh Void slumped down against the side of one of the grotesquely-carved bone-walls, exhaling sharply through his teeth.
"There's too many." Void held his head as a jolt of pain pulsed through it, "And none of it is useful!"
There were hundreds, maybe even thousands of scrolls stretched across the nightmarish library , and each was more indecipherable than the last. Obsidian hovered quietly at his side, faintly humming as he floated with a soft blue glow. He'd done all he could to scan them, but the scrolls refused to cooperate with traditional decryption.
The problem was clear. The scrolls weren't written in a readable language at all. They were magic containers, and acted more like compressed, living memories than any script.
To extract their knowledge, Void had to channel a trickle of Light into each one, triggering a playback of its encoded contents. The scroll would then lash his senses with ancient visions and whisper truths no soul was ever meant to hear.
And only after all that could Obsidian record the details as Void dictated to him.
"This is f**king ridiculous" Void muttered, throwing his head back against the wall. "This is the worst archival system in the galaxy."
Zamyr's voice drifted in with a teasing chuckle, ~I don't suppose you took the Hive as esteemed scholars~
Void squinted up at Zamyr's translucent spirit drifting near the high vaults of the chamber.
Zamyr had been quiet for a while, content to observe Void as he read through the scrolls. But now he hovered with more interest, his coiling form weaving through the air like a phantom.
~I'll admit~ Zamyr said, ~I'm rather impressed. You've waded through the filth of Hive memory longer than most would endure. O brother mine.~
Void's eyes gleamed in the low light, fatigue clear under his focused gaze. He exhaled another sigh, "Not much else can be done. I've seen hundreds of their stories now. Their wars. Their ascension rituals. How they… grow." He clenched a hand. "And I think I'm starting to understand their Sword Logic."
Zamyr's expression sharpened, his luminous eyes narrowing with amusement. ~Oh? Do tell.~
Void inhaled, his tone shifting as he leaned forward, energized by a dark curiosity that overpowered his exhaustion.
"It's all about survival," he said. "That much is obvious. But it's more than just surviving. It's about proving. To exist, you must struggle. Weak versus strong. Strong versus stronger. Every challenge is a test, and if you win, you claim the power of your enemy. If you lose, you feed the logic. You become a stepping stone."
Zamyr nodded slowly, his face twisting into an eerie grin.
He whispered as his sharp voice echoed, ~The Hive believe that existence itself is only justified through triumph. They see death not as an end, but as a transaction."
Void raised a brow, "Yeah. I did find that out. But, how do you know that?"
~I know, what you know. Except, I gaze into the branching realities that intertwines with our fate. Before you found out, I was also clueless. But now? I see countless realities of this knowledge. I see, what is unsaid.~
Void slowly nodded understanding how Zamyr's perception worked.
"Oddly, sword logic is something that rewards the soul. Something that can only be achieved when one believes in their own strength. In the end, you must risk your own soul to rightfully through battle."
Zamyr's eyes burned brighter. ~A stark contrast to the Light.~
Void nodded grimly. "The Traveler gives freely. It empowers us without demanding we take anything. Sword Logic says that's weakness. That to accept power is heresy."
He looked up, and rubbed his chin. "If that's the rule, then how do the Hive even see us? Its ironic that we are the abominations to them. We fight, we kill—but we do it with borrowed Light. To them, we're… broken. Liars. Cheats."
Zamyr's voice deepened, a solemn echo rising from his chest. ~And yet you win. That alone challenges their truth. It challenges everything they stand for.~
Zamyr paused, his eyes narrowed. ~And as you already suspect… only a being born of Light, who embraces the Dark, could try to embrace sword logic.~
Void fell silent only replying with a curt nod. The implication hung in the air between them, charged and unspoken.
He shifted the topic. "The magic's harder to grasp. It's not a belief system like the logic—it's… twisted. Messy. A corruption of natural laws."
~Indeed. Their magic is harder to grasp~
The air shifted. A tremor rippled through the World's Grave. The scroll racks rattled faintly. Dust and ash rained from the top of the towering shelves. Void tensed immediately, a shiver ran down his spine as his hand rested on Zamyr's hilt.
Zamyr's tone sharpened, his voice strained ~Something's changed. Omnigul the witch has sensed something.~
Void's eyes narrowed as he looked around. "I haven't triggered any wards. I've been careful."
~Indeed. But its not you, o brother mine~
Zamyrs eyes turned skyward. His phantom shivered as he snuck a peek at the surface.
~The surface stirs. Someone has come!~
Obsidian blinked to life, blinking in rapid diagnostic patterns. "Incoming Hive activity spike detected. Significant surface-level movement. Multiple rituals. High-power signatures."
Void's heart sunk as he kicked off the ground. "What changed?"
Obsidian's voice dipped as his eyes pulsed. "The Vanguard.....looks like the city sent in extraction teams. New Lights."
Void's eyes widened. "What? Now?"
Obsidian spun in a worried arc. "I wasn't monitoring comms, we're too deep to risk detection. But now that the silence is broken, looks like a full fireteam arrived on the moon less than ten minutes ago."
Void cursed under his breath.
Zamyr's phantom stilled, as if he was glancing at something beyond reality, something beyond the seams of the world.
~You must stop this, O brother mine. Omnigul must not leave the fortress, not now.~
Void's stomach twisted he nodded as he felt the urgency in the Ahamkara's voice.
He didn't know what the Ahamkara had seen, but suffice to say, he couldn't let that happen.
A second tremor hit, this one sharper—accompanied by a distant moan of displaced stone. Somewhere above, Hive shrieked.
Void's figure blurred in the dimness, he darted across the halls, rushing to get to the surface.
"Obsidian! Log the location." Void's eyes gleamed with urgency. "We'll come back later."
Void vaulted over bone-formed ledges and bolted through tunnels, shadows clinging to his heels. The winding stairs of the Temple of Crota loomed again ahead. Light flickered on his soles as Void sprang forth with a leap.
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[Ocean of Storms]
Eight transmats triggered as figures of light appeared onto a slope overlooking the desolate plains of the Moon, their boots crunching into the lunar soil.
IEatPaint stepped forward first, his helmet angled upward as he took in the massive curtain of darkness looming before them.
The Umbral Veil, thick as a wall and black as darkness. As the players stepped crept close, it rippled like liquid shadow in the sky, its presence cutting a jagged scar through the lunar landscape.
"Yo," BearSpray chuckled "Anyone else feel like we're about to die horribly?"
"That's exactly the vibes I am getting." TheOneWhoKnocks replied as he looked at the Veil.
"I think it's beautiful," Dumbledore murmured, and gestured to the pulsing veil. "Imagine a shader of that color for my robes. The drip would be, exquisite."
"True, but anyway." ThunderClappin groaned, hefting his pulse rifle. "Let's just find this 'asset' and get the hell out."
The Umbral Veil shifted slightly.
As the players walked forwards, their light illuminated the dark veil, revealing a narrow seam where the veil had been cut. The edges of the tear shimmered with pulsing static, like something had burned through the dark.
Waffles crouched beside the seam, scanning it. "Damn that's clean cut."
"Who the hell managed to cut through this though?" ILoveLoot was in awe as he saw the sheer scale of the Veil.
"I don't know man" Undecided, looked peeked through the gaps as his gaze settled on Hellmouth. "But that shi*, is the creepiest thing I've seen."
Moments later, the eight players cautiously slipped through the tear. But as they reached the other side, the Moon changed.
It was as if everything outside the Veil, was an illusion. What they saw inside, was a dark aura looming over the horizon. The sheer suppression had turned their HUD's dark. The color had bled from the lunar soil, replaced with pale ash.
They players didn't say a word, awed by what they were witnessing. They quietly walked along the fractured roads leading up to the ridges. But with each step, eerie whispers seemed to gnaw at their ears.
Strange screams and voices seemed to echo, and as they finally stood atop a ridge, overlooking the vast hollow of the Ocean of Storms, they saw a great fortress in the distance. An inverted fortress, that seemed to stretch deep into the ground.
Like a wound gouged into the Moon itself. It stretched like a monstrous eye in the distance, a labyrinthine pit ringed by hive towers, their spires bent and broken like rusted teeth.
"What the f*ck is that." Waffles spoke up, flabbergasted.
"Dude..." TheOneWhoKnocks looked at the towers, "That's the coolest f*cking thing I've seen."
"Uhuh." Undecided nodded, "As long as I don't have to go in there, its cool."
"Just me or the skies getting....kinda active?" Dumbledore looked at the horizon.
A haunting glow spilled across it as a pillar of emerald flame erupted from the Hellmouth's depths. The air trembled.
"Is that...normal?" IEatPaint looked around.
"F*ck if I know. Entire place looks like haunted." Waffles shivered with unease.
"Welp," LeroyJenkins muttered, "where we going though?"
No objective markers pinged on their HUDs. No navpoints. No map guidance. Just open space, and an instinctual pulse in their Ghosts that something was here. The players shared a glance.
"So? Whats the next step?" TheOneWhoKnocks asked.
"There is no next step." said Dumbledore. "Looks like the we gotta figure this out the hard way."
"Figure it out?" Undecided muttered as he looked ahead, "There's a haunted castle, and a f*cking desert around us. Figure what out?"
LeroyJenkins chimed in, "Hey, maybe this Vanguard asset is in the castle? So like, rescue the princess typa shit? Classic fantasy you know?"
"Slight correction." BearSpray cleared his throat, "That's a f*cking hellhole, not a castle."
"Uhuh, what else? The marker says search for and extract the asset. There's nothing else bro." ILoveLoot shrugged.
"Good thing we're professionals," Waffles shook her head "Let's do what we do best."
"F*ck around and find out?" Undecided chimed up.
"Yep, f*ck around and find out." Waffles summoned her sparrow as she rode down the ridge.
As the fireteams descended from the ridge. Their sparrows kicked up a wave of dust, revealing corpses and discarded bones underneath the lunar soil. The players moved deeper into the Ocean of Storms, they passed twisted monuments and runes etched in blood.
But no matter how far in they went, their HUDs never updated. There was no new objective, no trail to follow.
"Man, is this bugged?" IEatPaint sighed as he circled the same dune for the fourth time.
"Shit, could be." Undecided shrugged as he crouched atop the bones of an Ogre. It's massive rotting ribcage lay flat on the sand.
But just as the players eased into the routine of going around craters searching for hints. A strange mist began forming in the distance.
From the mist , emerged a line of Hive wizards in shrouded robes, flanked by towering Knights wielding axes crusted in bone.
"Yo! We found em." IEatPaint yelled as he took cover and aimed down sights.
Waffles and TheOneWhoKnocks flanked right, unloading shots into the Wizards as they ascended above the fray. BearSpray threw a grenade. Dumbledore shoot out rockets into the Knights.
But it wasn't enough.
For every Hive they killed, another seemed to spawn from the mist. And as their battle lengthened, the mist seemed to almost encircle them, trapping them in a ritual circle with an an unending stream of Hive Knights.
"This is too much!" ILoveLoot shouted.
"We can't break through!" ThunderClappin yelled. "That mist is expanding!"
Undecided glanced backwards, only a small section of their retreat was open. Seconds later, the other players had also realized the trap.
And the moment the players realized they couldn't win, they switched tactics and began to utilize the oldest and most effective commandment of warfare.
"F*ck it, RUN!"
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